Dramatic weather change predicted for Columbia

COLUMBIA — The past two days felt more like early spring than the middle of winter.

Here’s to hoping you made the most of it because a cold front is forecast to slam Missouri on Tuesday with arctic cold and gusty northwest winds.

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The temperature in Columbia rose from the teens on Friday morning to nearly 60 on Sunday. As the air warmed, Columbia's citizens came outside to enjoy the parks and get a few chores done.

Temperatures were predicted to be in the mid-50s Tuesday morning and then fall nearly 30 degrees by mid-day into the 20s. Lows Tuesday are expected to bottom out at a frigid 11 degrees.

The Tuesday outlook was so tricky that the National Weather Service on Monday evening had it broken down by the hour: A chance of rain before 1 p.m., chance of rain and snow between 1 and 2 p.m. and a chance of snow after 2 p.m.

As if the roller-coaster ride on Tuesday isn’t enough, the Weather Service was also warning about the potential for a major winter storm on Thursday and Friday.

Jim Kramper of the Weather Service office in St. Louis said late Monday that there was “no way of nailing it down yet” in terms of accumulations, but added that some areas in the region could see more than 6 inches.

The latest forecast put the chances of snow on Thursday at 50 percent with snow likely Thursday night and possibly into Friday.

Although forecasters hadn’t established an exact storm track or determined where the heaviest snow might fall, Kramper said the storm could affect as much as a 200-mile wide swath of the nation’s midsection.

He said more specific advisories could be posted as early as Wednesday.